Reviewed by Owen Richardson

If you like reading about brilliant young people destroying themselves, this is your book. It bills itself as the first independent biography of Amy Winehouse - that is, not by her father - but Howard Sounes or his publisher didn't seem to think this was enough, because he also takes the opportunity to retell the stories of other stars who died at the age of 27: Brian Jones, Janis Joplin, Jimi Hendrix, Jim Morrison and Kurt Cobain, whose mother coined the phrase: ''He's gone and joined that stupid club.''

Hard living started early will take its toll, and it's not a complete coincidence they all died when they did, but it's not a mystic number either, and Sounes disposes easily with the conspiracy theories that have collected around the dead stars. However, eventually, the inherent ghoulishness of the exercise asserts itself and has him sounding like a po-faced version of Kenneth Anger's camp masterpiece Hollywood Babylon. At Cobain's mansion: ''Leaving the property one day, one of Cali's friends thought she glimpsed a pale face watching them from an attic window. Was it Kurt, or was it Death?''

Advertisement

On the night Winehouse died: ''We can imagine Death materialising at the foot of her bed as the vodka bottle slipped from her glass and the last grains of sand ran through the hour-glass.''

Among the photos of his subjects looking wrecked there's even a still from The Seventh Seal.